favour to the benefits of private actors; which fixed engagements naturally abated the receipts of the days before and after them. But this unexpected aftercrop of "Cato," largely supplied to us those deficiencies, and was almost equal to two fruitful seasons in the same year; at the close of which the three managing actors found themselves each a gainer of thirteen hundred and fifty pounds. But to return to the first reception of this play from the public.

Although "Cato" seems plainly written upon what are called Whig principles, yet the Tories of that time had sense enough not to take it as the least reflection upon their administration; but, on the contrary, they seemed to brandish and vaunt their approbation of every sentiment in favour of liberty, which by a public act of their generosity was carried so high, that one day, while the play was acting, they collected fifty guineas in the boxes, and made a present of them to Booth, with this compliment-"For his honest opposition to a perpetual dictator, and his dying so bravely in the cause of liberty." What was insinuated by any part of these words, is not my affair; but so public a reward had the appearance of a laudable spirit which only such a play as "Cato" could have inspired; nor could Booth be blamed if, upon so particular a distinction of his merit, he began himself to set more value upon it. How far he might carry it, in making use of the favour he stood in with a certain nobleman then in power at court, was not difficult to penetrate, and indeed ought always to have been expected by the managing actors. For which of them (making the case every way his own) could with such advantages have contented himself in the humble station of an hired actor? But let us see how the managers stood severally affected upon this occasion.

Dogget, who expected, though he feared not, the attempt of what after happened, imagined he had thought of an expedient to prevent it; and to cover his design with all the art of a statesman, he insinuated to us (for he was a staunch Whig) that this present of fifty guineas was a sort of a Tory triumph, which they

had no pretence to; and that for his part he could not bear, that so redoubted a champion for liberty as Cato should be bought off to the cause of a contrary party. He therefore in the seeming zeal of his heart proposed, that the managers themselves should make the same present to Booth, which had been made him from the boxes the day before. This, he said, would recommend the equality and liberal spirit of our management to the town, and might be a means to secure Booth more firmly in our interest; it never having been known that the skill of the best actor had received so round a reward or gratuity in one day before. Wilks, who wanted nothing but abilities to be as cunning as Dogget, was so charmed with the proposal, that he longed that moment to make Booth the present with his own hands; and though he knew he had no right to do it without my consent, had no patience to ask it; upon which I turned to Dogget with a cold smile, and told him, that if Booth could be purchased at so cheap a rate, it would be one of the best proofs of his economy we had ever been beholden to. I therefore desired we might have a little patience; that our doing it too hastily might be only making sure of an occasion to throw the fifty guineas away; for if we should be obliged to do better for him, we could never expect that Booth would think himself bound in honour to refund them. This seemed so absurd an argument to Wilks, that he began with his usual freedom of speech to treat it as a pitiful evasion of their intended generosity. But Dogget, who was not so wide of my meaning, clapping his hand upon mine, said with an air of security, "Oh! do not trouble yourself: there must be two words to that bargain; let me alone to manage that matter." Wilks, upon this dark discourse, grew uneasy, as if there were some secret between us that he was to be left out of. Therefore, to avoid the shock of his intemperance, I was reduced to tell him that it was my opinion, that Booth would never be made easy by any thing we could do for him, until he had a share in the profits and management; and that, as he did not want

friends to assist him, whatever his merit might be before, every one would think, since his acting of Cato, he had now enough to back his pretensions to it. To which Dogget replied, that nobody could think his merit was slighted by so handsome a present as fifty guineas; and that for his further pretensions, whatever the license might avail, our property of house, scenes, and clothes, were our own, and not in the power of the crown to dispose of. To conclude, my objections that the money would be only thrown away, &c. were overruled; and the same night Booth had the fifty guineas, which he received with a thankfulness that made Wilks and Dogget perfectly easy; insomuch that they seemed for some time to triumph in their conduct, and often endeavoured to laugh my jealousy out of countenance. But in the following winter the game happened to take a different turn; and then, if it had been a laughing matter, I had as strong an occasion to smile at their former security. But before I make an end of this matter, I cannot pass over the good fortune of the company that followed us to the act at Oxford, which was held in the intervening summer. Perhaps too a short view of the stage in that different situation may not be unacceptable to the curious.

After the restoration of king Charles, before the cavalier and round-head parties, under their new denomination of Whig and Tory, began again to be politically troublesome, public acts at Oxford (as I find by the date of several prologues written by Dryden for Hart on those occasions) had been more frequently held than in later reigns. Whether the same party dissentions may have occasioned the discontinuance of them, is a speculation not necessary to be entered into. But these academical jubilees have usually been looked upon as a kind of congratulatory compliment to the accession of every new prince to the throne, and generally as such have attended them. King James, notwithstanding his religion, had the honour of it; at which the players as usual assisted. This I have only mentioned, to give the reader a theatrical anecdote of a

liberty which Tony Leigh the comedian took with the character of the well known Obadiah Walker, then head of University college, who in that prince's reign had turned Roman Catholic. The circumstance is this. In the latter end of the comedy called the "Committee," Leigh, who acted the part of Teague, hauling in Obadiah with a halter about his neck, whom, according to his written part, he was to threaten to hang for no better reason than his refusing to drink the king's health, here Leigh, to justify his purpose with a stronger provocation, put himself into a more than ordinary heat with his captive Obadiah; which having heightened his master's curiosity to know what Obadiah had done to deserve such usage, Leigh, folding his arms with a ridiculous stare of astonishment, replied "Upon my shoul, he has shange his religion." As the merit of this jest lay chiefly in the auditors' sudden application of it to the Obadiah of Oxford, it was received with all the triumph of applause which the zeal of a different religion could inspire. But Leigh was given to understand that the king was highly displeased at it, inasmuch as it had shown him that the university was in a temper to make a jest of his proselyte. But to return to the conduct of our own affairs there in 1712.

It had been a custom for the comedians, while at Oxford, to act twice a day; the first play ending every morning before the college hours of dining, and the other never to break into the time of shutting their gates in the evening. This extraordinary labour gave all the hired actors a title to double pay, which at the act in king William's time I had myself accordingly received there. But the present managers considering, that by acting only once a day, their spirits might be fresher for every single performance, and that by this means they might be able to fill up the term of their residence without the repetition of their best and strongest plays; and as their theatre was contrived to hold a full third more than the usual form of it had done, one house well filled might answer the profits of two but moderately taken up; being enabled too, by

their late success at London, to make the journey pleasant and profitable to the rest of their society,-they resolved to continue to them their double pay, notwithstanding this new abatement of half their labour. This conduct of the managers more than answered their intention, which was rather to get nothing themselves, than not let their fraternity be the better for the expedition. Thus they laid an obligation upon their company, and were themselves considerable, though unexpected, gainers by it. But my chief reason for bringing the reader to Oxford, was to show the different taste of plays there, from that which prevailed at London. A great deal of that false flashy wit, and forced humour, which had been the delight of our metropolitan multitude, was only rated there at its bare intrinsic value; applause was not to be purchased there, but by the true sterling, the sal atticum of a genius; unless where the skill of the actor passed it upon them with some extraordinary strokes of nature. Shakspeare and Jonson had there a sort of classical authority; for whose masterly scenes they seemed to have as implicit a reverence as formerly for the ethics of Aristotle; and were as incapable of allowing moderns to be their competitors as of changing their academical habits for gaudy colours or embroidery. Whatever merit therefore some few of our more politely written comedies might pretend to, they had not the same effect upon the imagination there, nor were received with that extraordinary applause they had met with from the people of mode and pleasure in London; whose vain accomplishments did not dislike themselves in the glass that was held to them. The elegant follies of higher life were not at Oxford among their acquaintance, and consequently might not be so good company to a learned audience, as nature in her plain dress, and unornamented in her pursuits and inclinations, seemed to be.

The only distinguished merit allowed to any modern writer, was to the author of Cato; which play being the flower of a plant raised in that learned garden, (for there Mr Addison had his education,) what favour may we